Public Bill Committee

[Mr. Edward O'Hara in the Chair]

Tony McNulty: On a point of order, Mr. O’Hara. It is more a point of information. Members of the Committee will see that I have tabled a letter to you and to Mr. Bercow, your co-Chairman. I am glad to see that the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome has a copy, because, as I promised, it refers specifically to “noxious things”. There is also a reference to jurisdiction and the retrospective nature. But I draw the Committee’s attention to the comments on jurisdiction in relation to Northern Ireland: there is a remote possibility that such a transfer of jurisdiction could include the Diplock provisions. I do not want that to be the case, and nor does the Committee. I therefore draw the Committee’s attention to the part of the letter that says that I shall table an amendment on Report to ensure that that potential, however remote, does not occur in the context of the relevant clauses. I hope that that is helpful to the Committee.

Edward O'Hara: I shall treat that as a request to make a statement for the information of the Committee.

David Heath: Further to that point of order, Mr. O’Hara. The Minister’s statement was extremely helpful. It is essential that we have sufficient time on Report to cover this now expansive range of issues. If there is any attempt to truncate the time available on Report, we will be in the same situation as we were with proceedings on the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008.

Edward O'Hara: We must now return to our business.

Clause 78 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 79

Designated gas transporters

Dominic Grieve: I beg to move amendment No. 202, in clause 79, page 56, line 19, leave out ‘negative resolution procedure’ and insert ‘affirmative procedure’.
We continue our consideration of gas transporters and utilities. The amendment raises the question of whether the designation of
“a person who is the holder of a licence”
as a “designated gas transporter” should be done by the affirmative or negative procedure. There are some serious financial implications to being so designated. I hope that we do not end up with someone challenging the designation and applying for judicial review. The provision might have serious financial implications for companies; I therefore believe that it ought to be given proper scrutiny by Parliament.

David Heath: I tend to agree with the hon. and learned Gentleman. If anyone had any doubt about the deficiencies of the negative procedure, they would only have to have been at business questions this morning. My hon. Friend the Member for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) pointed out how extraordinary it is that orders can be made that are subject to that procedure, and despite there being a prayer against such orders, they can come into effect and be in effect for some time prior to any debate taking place in the House. On Tuesday evening, a Minister agreed that an order was deficient and offered to come back with a new one, despite the fact that it had been in place for some time. Such procedural matters are not for the Committee, but they nevertheless need to be addressed in the near future.

Dominic Grieve: When I was a member of the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, I learned that although the Committee can consider an instrument and regard it as defective, it does not prevent the Government from going ahead and implementing it under the negative procedure.

David Heath: The hon. and learned Gentleman is absolutely right. These are not matters that we can consider now, but he underlines the point that the negative procedure is not satisfactory for making rules and regulations that could materially affect the interests of an individual or a company.

Tony McNulty: It is an interesting debate, and one for which I have some degree of sympathy. Any number of times on Committee I have flipped from the negative to the affirmative in the interests of scrutiny, but I am not going to do so on this one. The matters concerned are of such importance that the sooner, for example, the police are deployed to a particular location, the better. The negative procedure approval mechanism is appropriate in this case. However, I do have a lot of sympathy for what has been said.
I never had the dubious pleasure of being on the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, but I am sure that it is very interesting. We have had some fun quite recently with a statutory instrument that it sent back about 10 times as deficient, and we did not lay it until we got it in order for the JCSI—that is the Home Office being cutting-edge as usual in terms of the primacy of parliamentary scrutiny.
On the substance of the amendment, notwithstanding the importance of the potential impact on a designated individual, the negative procedure is appropriate. While the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling and I have anything to do with it, we will deal with the matter when and if such an order is prayed against. For all the reasons outlined, I would rather resist the amendment and stick with the negative procedure in this case, although I have some sympathy with the broader ideals.

Dominic Grieve: I will not press this matter to the vote. I suppose that if we ever get a situation in which the Secretary of State makes a designation, it is challenged by the gas transporter and the issue subsequently gets raised on the Floor of the House, I shall say to the Minister, “I told you so.” Subject to that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 79 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 80

Costs of policing at gas facilities: recovery of costs

Dominic Grieve: I beg to move amendment No. 203, in clause 80, page 56, leave out lines 38 to 40.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendment:
No. 204, in clause 80, page 57, line 1, leave out paragraph (a).

Dominic Grieve: These are more in the nature of probing amendments. I do not find the implications of the clause particularly easy to follow. Will the Minister explain how the system will treat the payment or costs, and how he will be able to determine or designate them?

Tony McNulty: I am very happy to do that and will, if I may, treat this as a clause stand part debate as well, effectively.
Clause 80 provides the means for a designated gas transporter to recover any payment or cost that he has incurred with respect to the provision of extra policing at gas facilities. A designated gas transporter will be able to recover any payments he has made or costs that he has incurred from consumers via the regulatory arrangements in place for the term of the gas transporter’s transmission charges. We wish to ensure that the recovery of any payments made or costs incurred by a transporter is without detriment to the transporter’s finances and is not at risk of a future change of view as to how those payments or costs are to be treated by the industry regulator.
In crafting the recovery mechanism, we have provided that the mechanism applies despite anything in the gas transporter’s licence, issued under section 7 of the Gas Act 1986, that would prevent the transporter from recovering such payments or costs.
Amendment No. 203 would remove the provision in subsection (3) which disapplies any licence condition that would hinder or obstruct the recovery of payment or costs made or incurred by the gas transporter. In addition, our consultations with the industry show that they desire certainty—quite naturally—and have agreed to this recovery mechanism on the assurance that there would be no obstacles to them being able to get reimbursement of the policing costs placed on them by the Secretary of State. As a result, removal of the provision could seriously impede the ability of the Secretary of State to recover the costs of extra policing.
Amendment No. 204 appears to attempt to restrict the Secretary of State’s means to implement cost recovery for police deployment. To facilitate the recovery of payments made or charges incurred by the gas transporter, subsection (4) of clause 80 provides a means for the Secretary of State to direct the industry regulator to allow the payments made and costs incurred by the gas transporter to be taken into account in determining the transporter’s charges, either in determining its current year charges or by allowing the designated transporter to take the costs into account as an allowable regulatory cost over an agreed longer period.
In short, the provision allows the Secretary of State to direct the regulator to ensure that the designated gas transporter is able to recover its costs for policing. The amendment removes the ability of the Secretary of State to direct the regulator to treat the costs of the designated gas transporter in a particular way—for example, as if they were operating expenditure for the purposes of the regular price control mechanism. That would negate the proposed recovery mechanisms of clauses 79 to 82, so I would ask that the amendment be withdrawn.
The difficulty is imposing a recovery mechanism on an industry that, quite rightly, already has a rather complex regulatory framework under Ofgem. I apologise for the clumsiness of the architecture, but we are trying to deal with existing law, the regulatory framework and the new elements, and that explains the complexity. In that context, I would ask that the amendment be withdrawn.

Dominic Grieve: The Minister has done a good job of explaining what was previously somewhat opaque, and I am most grateful to him. I beg to ask to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 80 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

None

Costs of policing at gas facilities: supplementary provisions

Dominic Grieve: I beg to move amendment No. 205, page 57, line 22, leave out ‘28 days’ and insert ‘6 months’.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 206, page 57, line 26, leave out subsection (3).

Dominic Grieve: I sense the desire of the Committee to make progress. Clause 81 states that
“the Secretary of State is not required...to take into account representations made after the end of the period of 28 days beginning with the day on which the person making the representations was consulted”.
The first question is: is that long enough? The amendment we suggest is to substitute six months. On the second matter, we considered whether we should leave out subsection (3) simply because I would like the Minister to tell me what subsection (3) actually means.

Tony McNulty: Clause 81 places on the Secretary of State the statutory obligation to consult both the regulator—Ofgem—and the designated gas transporter before requiring the payment of any costs under clauses 77 or 78. In so consulting, the Secretary of State is not required by subsection (2)(a) of this clause to take into account, as the hon. and learned Gentleman says, any representations made after 28 days. In effect, this provision sets a 28-day cut-off date for representations to the Secretary of State, so that discussions of the details of the cost recovery mechanism can proceed quickly—which, I think, is in everybody’s interests—based on the issues raised by the affected main parties, namely the transporter and the regulator, during the consultation period. The hon. and learned Gentleman asked quite fairly whether that was enough: in our view, the answer is yes.
Amendment No. 206 seeks to remove the relevant subsection entirely. That would create a conflict between the principal objective and general duties of the Secretary of State and the authority in this area, and the exercise of the functions under clauses 77 to 81 of the Bill. The deletion of the subsection might prevent the Secretary of State and the industry regulator from using the powers under these provisions. The subsection allows the regulator to permit the cost of recovery arrangement for the specific purpose, without being in breach of its own obligations. As with the complexities we talked of earlier, we now have not only the law governing gas regulators but the provisions in this Bill; not only the regulatory framework that the designated transporter operates on, but the law and the statutory obligations that the regulator has. Despite its complexities, the provision is intended to afford the regulator the right to disapply its own obligations in the course of allowing the designated transporter to recover its policing costs. That sounded complex even when I said it, and the drafting of it is equally complex. I apologise for that, but it needs to be that way to allow choreography between the position and obligations of the Secretary of State and the regulator, and to allow their relationship with the designated transporter.

Dominic Grieve: I am most grateful to the Minister for his answers on amendment No. 206. To return to amendment No. 205, has he consulted the industry about whether 28 days is sufficient?

Tony McNulty: As I understand it, we have certainly consulted about the overall architecture. I am not entirely sure whether we have consulted specifically on 28 days, but I shall provide the hon. and learned Gentleman with the answer before Report. As I have indicated, we have certainly consulted on the broad thrust of how the whole thing will work. I ask that the amendment be withdrawn.

Dominic Grieve: I am grateful to the Minister for his replies on both matters. I look forward to hearing from him about the consultation period and to hearing his explanations of the operation of various sections of the Gas Act 1986. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 81 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 82 to 89 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 6

Repeals

Tony McNulty: I beg to move amendment No. 77, in schedule 6, page 82, line 26, at end insert—
‘Terrorism Act 2000 (c. 11)
In Schedule 8, in paragraph 29(4)(a) and (c), the words “after consulting the Lord Chancellor”.’.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss Government new clause 4—Pre-charge detention: minor amendments.

Tony McNulty: Although amendment No. 77 is the lead amendment, it is simply a consequential amendment, giving effect to new clause 4, which rectifies an error in schedule 8 to the Terrorism Act 2000. Paragraph 9 of that schedule refers to
“the consequence specified in paragraph 8(5)(c).”
However—I am surprised that the Liberal Democrats have not noticed this, as they are usually good at such things—there is no paragraph 8(5)(c). It is a little over the top, since that paragraph was substituted by section 456 and paragraph 39(1) of schedule 11 to the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. The purpose of the amendment is to rectify that appalling error, which was caused by the 2002 Act failing to make the necessary consequential amendment. That horrified me, as I am sure that it horrifies everybody else.
Proposed subsection (2) of new clause 4 is more substantive. Schedule 1 to the Bill amends the 2000 Act to provide for the new reserve power in relation to pre-charge detention in terrorism cases. The new provisions will require any application further to extend the period of pre-charge detention to be made to a senior judge. For England and Wales, that is defined as a High Court judge or a circuit judge designated by the Lord Chief Justice. For Northern Ireland, it is a High Court or county court judge designated by the Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland. That designation is because when we have discussed terrorism legislation and considered judicial oversight in the past, we have got rather hung up on judges’ status rather than their experience.
The Lord Chief Justice has written to us and said that it is not very useful to go for a circuit judge or High Court judge if their experience, such as it is, is in civil or matrimonial law, for instance. It is not their status that matters, but their experience. That, principally, is what we refer to in proposed subsection (2), which is why we think it more than appropriate that, yes, it should be a High Court or circuit judge, but it should be one designated by the Lord Chief Justice, who knows far better than the House about the experience of individuals. That is what new clause 4(2) does, and I hope that both measures are greeted with the equanimity that they deserve.

David Heath: Mr. O’Hara, I felt I was chided by the Minister for not having spotted this, and I can only offer my most sincere apologies to the entire Committee for not having done so. Imagine my glee—imagine my smugness—had I spotted it. All that is now lost.

Amendment agreed to.

Tony McNulty: I beg to move amendment No. 78, in page 83, column 2, leave out lines 6 and 7 and insert—
‘Regulation 45E(3) and (4).
In Regulation 109— (a) paragraph (1)(g) to (i); (b) in paragraph (4)(a), the words preceding paragraph (i); (c) paragraph (4)(b) and the word “and” immediately preceding it.
In Regulation 115(2), “45E(3),”.’.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Government amendment No. 79.
Government new schedule 2—Disclosure and the intelligence services: consequential amendments.

Tony McNulty: These amendments reconcile the “disclosure and the intelligence services” provisions of clauses 19 to 21 with existing legislation through consequential amendments. Had this been done in the 2002 Bill, I would not have had to move the last amendment. That is by the bye.
The amendments alter the representation of the people regulationsfor England, Wales and Scotland, removing restrictions on the intelligence and security agencies for normal disclosure, as these will now be covered by clause 19. They also preserve all rights conferred on the intelligence and security agencies to obtain information from the electoral register under the regulations.
Section 9(2)(a) of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 is removed, because there will be no need for a special information gateway for regular departments to pass information to the intelligence and security agencies once the new provisions are enacted.
Section 38 is removed from the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006, which I took through and lovingly know as “IAN”, as there will be no need for a special information gateway to the intelligence and security agencies for immigration and nationality purposes.
Subsection 67 and subsection 39(4)(g) of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007, both of which I have been assured exist, are removed, as there is no need for a special information gateway there, either.
In essence, these are technical amendments to ensure that the provisions in clauses 19 to 21 have their intended effect, and I commend them to the Committee.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: No. 79, in page 83, column 2, leave out lines 10 and 11 and insert—
‘Regulation 45D(3) and (4).
In Regulation 108— (a) paragraph (1)(g) to (i); (b) in paragraph (4)(a), the words preceding paragraph (i); (c) paragraph (4)(b) and the word “and” immediately preceding it.
In Regulation 115(2), “45D(3),”.’.—[Mr. McNulty.]

David Heath: I will not move amendment No. 49, because it and the amendments with which it is grouped deal with the reform of the control order regime. I have given careful thought to this, and I think that we could usefully devote an hour and a half to two hours to that subject. Given that it is something that needs debating and that, in this last sitting, we still have to deal with very important issues under the new clauses, it is not appropriate for me to move the amendment, and therefore I do not intend to do so.

Schedule 6, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 90

Commencement

Dominic Grieve: I beg to move amendment No. 223, in page 60, line 4, at end insert ‘subject to subsections (7) and (8).’.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 224, in page 60, line 7, at end add—
‘(7) Section 22 (period of pre-charge detention) and Schedule 1 (amendments relating to period of pre-charge detention), shall not come into effect until codes of practice under section 66 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 regulating such detention shall have been approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.
(8) Section 23 (period of post charge questioning) shall not come into effect until the codes of practice under section 66 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and referred to in section 23(4) shall have been approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.’.

Dominic Grieve: These amendments concern the commencement orders in clause 90 and the opportunity it gives to us here to consider whether we wish to introduce any impediments to those commencement orders. Both amendments are designed to do that. Although I have moved the lead amendment, perhaps it would have been more proper for my right hon. and learned Friend to have done so. Without in any way wishing to object to the generality of the provisions, particularly with regard to pre-charge detention, in relation to which the Minister knows our views, it seems to us that in the case of both pre-charge detention and post-charge questioning, it would be wrong for the power to come into operation, unless new codes of practice under section 66 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 regulating such detention are approved by a resolution of both Houses of Parliament.
I wonder whether it is possible for the Minister to accept that, because in practical terms I do not see how either could be properly implemented unless those rules have first been approved. It is therefore a fairly simple issue. As I have said, that does not in any way diminish our objection in principle to the changes on pre-charge detention, and although we are in favour of post-charge questioning, both ought to be subject to a provision so that they cannot operate until we have resolutions from both Houses of Parliament in favour of the regulations. That will be absolutely key to whether this works properly, as we debated earlier.

David Heath: These amendments, particularly as they refer to post-charge questioning, are entirely in line with our earlier debate. The Minster made it perfectly plain that the amendments to the PACE codes of conduct were needed and that it would not be possible for the measure to be implemented until they were in place. Indeed, he suggested that he would make every endeavour to ensure that the draft PACE codes of conduct were available to us before Report. He resisted the view in the first instance that the Bill should include an explicit requirement with regard to the PACE codes, but he undertook to consider it in the period between the Committee’s proceedings and Report.
We did not have identical undertakings with regard to pre-charge detention, because the debate on pre-charge detention took a rather different course and there were more substantive issues to be discussed, but exactly the same arguments apply in both cases. Therefore, I entirely support the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham. His amendments seem to have been hijacked by his Front-Bench colleague, but he will nevertheless have an opportunity to speak in a moment.

Dominic Grieve: The only reason why they were hijacked was because I was unaware that my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham had metamorphosed behind me at that moment, and I wanted to ensure that they were discussed.

David Heath: The right hon. and learned Gentleman has most certainly metamorphosed, or at least appeared, and will no doubt wish to add his comments in just a moment. The amendment is sensible. In material terms, it probably makes little difference, because I think that the Minister will give a clear undertaking in any case, so that there cannot be implementation until the PACE codes have been amended. That being the case, given that he has reassured Members on this side of the Committee and that it is the last sitting of the Committee, the Minister might be predisposed to accept the amendments as proposed, although I have a nagging doubt that that will not be the case.

Douglas Hogg: I am grateful for the support of the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome, and indeed for the hijacking by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield. It is important to have the codes of practice enforced before the relevant parts of the Bill are enacted and come into force, because clearly the powers that are being taken are far-reaching, and it would be quite wrong for those powers to be in existence without the codes that will prevent the abuse of detained people.
The Minister has said on a number of occasions that he intends the codes to be passed before the relevant parts of the Bill become law. I hope he will forgive my observing that parliamentary time is not at his exclusive disposal. Ultimately, the Leader of the House and the usual channels will determine when the codes will be subject to affirmative procedure. Today, the Leader of the House explained that she did not know why a statutory instrument had not been debated long after it had been brought into force. I therefore think that the Minister ought to accept that the relevant parts of the Bill will not come into force until the codes have received the approval of both Houses, as prescribed by amendment No. 224.

Tony McNulty: We are in danger of confusing ourselves on the issue of pre-charge detention. There is a well established PACE regime for pre-charge detention, not much of which will need to be substantially changed if schedule 1 becomes law. There may be some minor matters under code H regarding the protection of detained persons in matters such as transfers to prison and access to solicitors. Much of the paraphernalia is already in place for the 28-day regime. The changes might be so minor that they do not even require a statutory instrument.
We must not confuse and conflate the two arguments. There is a substantive argument before the Committee on post-charge questioning, but hon. Members will remember that I am deciding whether we can attach sufficient safeguards through the PACE codes or whether they need to be included in the Bill. Because I have not had much time, I have not reconciled myself to which option is best. It would be rather curious if I were to adopt an amendment committing to amendments to PACE but agree on Report with the thrust of our debate on post-charge questioning and the view of Liberty that the safeguards should be in the Bill. At the least, the first part of the amendment referring to pre-charge detention is unnecessary and the second is precipitate.

David Heath: The Minister is saying what I expected. However, he is not entirely right that amendment No. 224 pre-empts the decision that he is considering. Even if his view was that there should be safeguards in the Bill, there would still need to be revisions of the PACE codes, which would still have to be brought forward by statutory instrument. Therefore the argument that implementation should not take place until the PACE codes are published would still hold.

Tony McNulty: No, it would not. There is a substantive debate—I hesitate to say in the real world—outside this House that post-charge questioning will work only if there is a statutory model of safeguards in primary legislation, entirely outwith the PACE regulations. I do not know whether that is where we will end up, but if it is and the amendment is passed, we will be saying that having determined as a House that the post-charge questioning regime is better put in primary legislation completely separate from PACE, we cannot commence that part of the Bill until the PACE regulations have been suitably amended.
If I satisfy the House, as I expect that I will, that PACE is the principal instrument—although perhaps not the exclusive instrument—for oversight and safeguards on post-charge questioning, the subsequent statutory instruments will be passed by affirmative procedure, as they always have been. We should be able to capture the concerns of hon. Members at that point, rather than now.
The first part of the amendment relating to pre-charge detention is not necessary at all; if, subsequent to investigation after the Bill has been passed, or if, during our deliberations it seems that there have been more substantive changes to PACE from what after all is an extension to an existing regime already covered by code H, that is something that we would have to return to. It is a little premature to insist on PACE provision for post-charge questioning, because in the end that may not be the route that we collectively decide to take for oversight and safeguards. On that basis, the amendment should be withdrawn.

Dominic Grieve: I am not persuaded by the Minister’s argument. He makes a good point when he says that in reality an extension from 28 to 42 days may require only minor amendments to the existing code. It will certainly require some amendments, I think, but I accept that they may be of a minor nature. Nevertheless, they will have to have been done before the change starts. I was therefore puzzled by his comments about post-charge questioning not being handled under PACE at all. I suppose that it is possible that a separate set of rules could be introduced for it, but I would have thought that it would be sensible for it to be dealt with as an amendment to PACE and have never envisaged otherwise. It is essential that those codes are in place.
If the Minister is prepared to give me an undertaking that he can give assurances to the House on Report that there will be codes in place prior to any introduction of the measures, I will withdraw the amendment. If he is not, I shall press it to a vote to mark the point that many on the Committee are concerned about this matter.

Tony McNulty: I can, with a degree of confidence, give that undertaking. I was not suggesting that post-charge questioning, whatever regime we settle on, should be all outwith PACE; I am merely saying that there is a debate about whether that is the way to deal with the problem for the security of the defendant, rather than through PACE. That is not my view, but it is a view that is out there.

Douglas Hogg: May I express a word of caution? If I have correctly understood the right hon. Gentleman, it is at least possible that his Department will conclude that the safeguards in respect of post-charge questioning should be the subject of future legislation. I am not saying that that will be the case, but that it is a possibility. I may have misunderstood him.

Tony McNulty: No, what I was saying was that if—it is a remote if—the Government decided that post-charge questioning needed its own new statutory model totally outwith PACE, that would be forthcoming during the parliamentary proceedings of the Bill, and not in subsequent new legislation.

Douglas Hogg: I am glad, because I was going to say that if I had correctly understood the right hon. Gentleman, we could see quite a long delay before post-charge questioning came into effect, which would be regrettable, but it appears that I had misunderstood and I am sorry for that fact.

Dominic Grieve: I am grateful for those comments from the Minister and I will withdraw the amendment. Before I do so, I should say that although he has clarified the point, one of my concerns is that while we have argued there should be a degree of judicial supervision for the post-charge questioning process, even if there were judicial supervision, we would still need regulations for covering how it is carried out. I never saw that issue as being a case of either/or, and I see the Minister nodding so I think that we are on the same wavelength on that point. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 90 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 91

Commencement

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Douglas Hogg: I want to refer to a point that I have already made, namely that the Bill applies to every part of the United Kingdom. The debate has conducted largely by hon. Members who represent constituencies in England and Wales, and it is of course true that those parts of the UK are perhaps the most primarily affected, but I am uneasy about the fact that so far as I am aware, we have had no contribution of any kind from the Northern Ireland Office. While I acknowledge that there is an hon. Member—[Interruption.]—no, my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate is not a Northern Ireland spokesman. While I acknowledge the fact that there is a Scottish member of the Committee, that hon. Member has not played a huge part in the debate, and I am uneasy about that. We are legislating without input from other parts of the United Kingdom. I therefore suggest that as a matter of general practice, we should invite written evidence from the relevant Departments—in this case the Scotland Office and the Northern Ireland Office—with regard to the clauses that bite on Northern Ireland and Scotland. It is unsatisfactory that the Committee has had no substantive input from those two Departments, when the Bill affects them.

Tony McNulty: I certainly do not agree with that in the case of Scotland. We had, by common consent, a very productive and illuminating session with the Lord Advocate, who more than adequately covered most of the Scottish dimension. I am not, on this occasion, offending the hon. Member for Reigate, but the usual channels were asked by the Democratic Unionist party, “If your side would give up one place for the DUP because of the Northern Ireland dimension—” [Interruption] They were asked, because they made the same recommendation. It worked for Plaid Cymru, so I ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman look to the mote in his own eye.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 91 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 92 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

New Clause 4

Pre-charge detention: minor amendments
‘(1) In paragraph 9 of Schedule 8 to the Terrorism Act 2000 (direction that detained person may consult solicitor only within sight and hearing of qualified officer), for sub-paragraph (3) (grounds on which direction may be given) substitute—
“(3) A direction under this paragraph may be given only if the officer giving it has reasonable grounds for believing—
(a) that, unless the direction is given, the exercise of the right by the detained person will have any of the consequences specified in paragraph 8(4), or
(b) that the detained person has benefited from his criminal conduct and that, unless the direction is given, the exercise of the right by the detained person will hinder the recovery of the value of the property constituting the benefit.”.
(2) In paragraph 29(4) of that Schedule (meaning of “judicial authority”), in paragraphs (a) and (c) omit “after consulting the Lord Chancellor”.’.—[Mr. McNulty.]

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 6

Certificate requiring inquest to be held without a jury: Northern Ireland
‘(1) In section 13(1) of the Coroners Act (Northern Ireland) 1959 (c. 15) (power of coroner to hold inquest) after “sub-section (2)” insert “and section 18A”.
(2) In section 18 of that Act (requirement to summon jury in certain cases) after subsection (4) insert—
“(5) This section is subject to section 18A (certificate requiring inquest to be held without a jury).”.
(3) After that section insert—
“18A Certificate requiring inquest to be held without a jury
(1) The Secretary of State may certify in relation to an inquest that, in the opinion of the Secretary of State, the inquest will involve the consideration of material that should not be made public—
(a) in the interests of national security,
(b) in the interests of the relationship between the United Kingdom and another country, or
(c) otherwise in the public interest.
(2) A certificate may be issued—
(a) in relation to an inquest that has not begun, or
(b) in relation to an inquest that has begun, at any time before its conclusion.
(3) Where a certificate has effect in relation to an inquest, the inquest must be held or (as the case may be) continued without a jury, so that—
(a) if a jury has not been summoned, the coroner must not cause a jury to be summoned, and
(b) if a jury has been summoned, the coroner must discharge the jury.
(4) Accordingly, the following do not apply in relation to the inquest whilst the certificate has effect—
(a) the power under subsection (1) of section 13 or subsection (2) of section 18 to hold the inquest or part of the inquest with a jury, and
(b) the duty under subsection (1) of section 18 to hold the inquest with a jury in the circumstances set out in that subsection.
(5) A certificate has effect in relation to an inquest until it is revoked by the Secretary of State; and the Secretary of State may revoke a certificate in respect of an inquest—
(a) before it has begun, or
(b) after it has begun, at any time before its conclusion.
(6) Where a certificate issued in relation to an inquest is revoked—
(a) if subsection (1) of section 18 applies in relation to the inquest, the coroner must cause a jury to be summoned in accordance with that subsection, and
(b) otherwise, if it appears to the coroner that it is desirable to summon a jury, the coroner may cause a jury to be summoned in accordance with that subsection.
(7) If a jury is summoned—
(a) the coroner must proceed in all respects as if the inquest had not previously begun, and
(b) the provisions of this Act apply accordingly as if that were the case.”.
(4) This section has effect in relation to inquests that have begun, but have not been concluded, before the day on which it comes into force as well as to inquests beginning on or after that day.’.—[Mr. McNulty.]

Brought up, read the First time and Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Clause 1

Offences related to terrorism: evidence
‘(1) In considering whether a person is involved in terrorism, the Court may take account of any evidence admissible under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (c. 23).
(2) Schedule [Intercept evidence] (which makes provision for the admissibility of intercept evidence in cases involving terrorism) has effect.’.—[Mr. Heath.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

David Heath: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: New clause 12—Intercept evidence: regulations —
‘(1) The Secretary of State must, by 31st July 2010, make regulations which make provision for the use of “intercept evidence” and “metering evidence” in criminal proceedings.
(2) The regulations made under subsection (1) shall be made by statutory instrument which are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.’.
New schedule 1—Intercept evidence—

Admissibility of intercept and metering evidence
1 (1) Notwithstanding section 17 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (c. 23) (“RIPA”), evidence of—
(a) the contents of an intercepted communication (“intercept evidence”), and
(b) communications data (“metering evidence”),
shall be admissible in criminal proceedings to which this paragraph applies.
(2) This paragraph applies to—
(a) proceedings in respect of serious crime, and
(b) proceedings in respect of an offence or offences relating to terrorism.
(3) An application for permission to introduce intercept evidence or metering evidence, or both, may be made by the prosecution for the purpose of conducting a criminal prosecution to which this paragraph applies, and not otherwise.
(4) Unless and until an application has been made by the prosecution in any such proceedings the provisions of section 17 of RIPA (exclusion of matters from legal proceedings) shall continue to apply in connection with those proceedings.

Considerations for allowing intercept or metering evidence
2 In deciding whether to admit intercept or metering evidence the court shall take account of all relevant considerations, including in particular—
(a) any application by the Secretary of State to withhold the evidence or part of the evidence on the ground that its disclosure, or the disclosure of facts relating to the obtaining of the evidence, would be contrary to the public interest, and
(b) any submission that the evidence was obtained unlawfully.

Interpretation
3 In this Schedule—
“communications data” has the same meaning as in section 21(4) of RIPA;
“intercepted communication” has the same meaning as in section 4 of RIPA;
“RIPA” means the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (c. 23);
“serious crime” has the same meaning as in section 81(2)(b) of RIPA;
“terrorism” has the same meaning as in the Terrorism Act 2000 (c. 11).

Minor and consequential amendments
4 In section 5(3)(b) of RIPA, for the words “or detecting” substitute “, detecting or prosecuting”.’.
New schedule 4—Intercept evidence (No. 2)—

Admissibility of intercept and metering evidence
5 (1) Notwithstanding section 17 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (c. 23) (“RIPA”), evidence of—
(a) the contents of an intercepted communication (“intercept evidence”), and
(b) communications data (“metering evidence”),
shall be admissible in criminal proceedings commenced on or after 31st July 2010 to which this paragraph applies.
(2) This paragraph applies to proceedings in respect of an offence or offences relating to terrorism.
(3) An application for permission to introduce intercept evidence or metering evidence, or both, may be made by the prosecution for the purpose of conducting a criminal prosecution to which this paragraph applies, and not otherwise.
(4) Unless and until an application has been made by the prosecution in any such proceedings the provisions of section 17 of RIPA (exclusion of matters from legal proceedings) shall continue to apply in connection with those proceedings.

Considerations for allowing intercept or metering evidence
6 In deciding whether to admit intercept or metering evidence the court shall take account of all relevant considerations, including in particular—
(a) any application by the Secretary of State to withhold the evidence or part of the evidence on the ground that its disclosure, or the disclosure of facts relating to the obtaining of the evidence, would be contrary to the public interest, and
(b) any submission that the evidence was obtained unlawfully.

Interpretation
7 In this Schedule—
“communications data” has the same meaning as in section 21(4) of RIPA;
“intercepted communication” has the same meaning as in section 4 of RIPA;
“RIPA” means the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (c. 23);
“serious crime” has the same meaning as in section 81(2)(b) of RIPA;
“terrorism” has the same meaning as in the Terrorism Act 2000 (c. 11).

Minor and consequential amendments
8 In section 5(3)(b) of RIPA, for the words “or detecting” substitute “, detecting or prosecuting”.’.

David Heath: We now come to the big missing segment of the Bill—the use in criminal trials of intercept evidence and the admissibility of such evidence. This is a matter which has been raised repeatedly over the years and which many of us feel very strongly ought to be part of the apparatus available to prosecutors in order to bring successful prosecutions. That certainly applies in terrorism cases where there is a strong argument for it, but I also believe that it would make a significant contribution to the fight against organised crime.
Hitherto, Governments have always been extremely reluctant to accede to such requests. That reluctance has been because of strongly held views from the security services about the effect on the operability of their systems in the event of disclosure. I understand those concerns and the reservations that have been expressed but I have always felt that it is not impossible to create a legal architecture that would allow for the admissibility of evidence in some cases that would be of benefit to the prosecution of those offences. Although it is always very comforting to look at the experience of other jurisdictions and to say that if they can do it we can do it, I recognise that that is not necessarily as simple as it seems. Very few jurisdictions approach such subjects identically. Nevertheless, my party’s view, and I believe that of the Conservative party, has been for some time that that is something for which we must make arrangements for the security of our country and to ensure that the police, the intelligence services and our prosecutors can do their jobs in the most effective way.
The new clauses are not of my own construction but are taken from new clauses or amendments tabled by Lord Lloyd of Berwick and debated in another place in the context of previous Bills. I thought that they would be a useful platform on which we could hold this debate. Since I tabled the new clauses we have had an extremely useful seminar. Can I say again how grateful I am to the Minister for arranging that seminar and for the clarity and openness of the senior officials who attended and spoke to us about the issues that they face? I found it illuminating as, I suspect, did other members of the Committee.
We also have the new clause and schedule in the name of the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield. There is a substantive difference between his and mine in that he seeks to provide a timetable for the implementation of the admissibility. That has a lot to commend it. I will not steal his thunder by speaking to his new clause before he has the opportunity to do so but, when I look at his proposal and my proposal, I think that his has more merit, in that it means that the Government stick to the assurances given.
The difference between the situation now and the situation when these or similar new clauses and amendments were first tabled is that we have had the Chilcot review, which was extremely useful because it addressed these issues seriously. For the record, that was the Privy Council review of intercept as evidence under the chairmanship of Sir John Chilcot with his colleagues Lord Archer of Sandwell, Lord Hurd of Westwell and my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith). They looked in considerable depth at the operational and legislative obstacles to the adoption of new procedures which the Prime Minister has now indicated that he wishes to see. 
I remind the Committee that when the Chilcot review considered the matter in detail it came to the conclusion that there were risks to the strategic capability of the UK’s intelligence agencies but that they could be overcome by appropriate legislative and operational measures. It set out in very clear terms the requirements for intercept as evidence to be operationally workable, not why it could not be implemented but how it could be implemented and how the difficulties which they recognised could be circumvented. It set out:
“The intercepting agency shall decide whether a prosecution involving their intercepted material shall proceed”—
not whether the prosecution should proceed but whether a prosecution involving their intercepted material should proceed.
Secondly, it said:
“Intercepted material originating from the intelligence agencies shall not be disclosed beyond cleared judges, prosecutors, or special (defence) advocates, except in a form agreed by the originator”—
a proposal that one would expect in that context.
“Material intercepted (by any agency) through the use of sensitive Sigint techniques shall not be disclosed unless the Secretary of State is satisfied that disclosure will not put the capability and techniques at risk.”
That is an important safeguard for the operational integrity of some of the processes used.
“No intelligence or law enforcement agency shall be required to retain raw intercepted material for significantly more or less time than needed for operational purposes (which may include using the material as evidence).”
That recognises the huge churning, the turnover of this sort of material, and the fact that the intelligence agencies have a specific purpose in looking at that intercept material. It is not for some archiving purpose; it is to see whether there is evidence of criminal activity, either now or envisaged in the future. Therefore, it is not normally retained, and nor should we expect vast quantities of material to be retained.
The next point is:
“No intelligence or law enforcement agency shall be required to examine, transcribe or make notes of intercepted material to a substantially higher standard than it believes is required to meet its objectives (which may include, but are not limited to, using material as evidence)”—
again, a practical point to ensure that we do not put a bureaucratic burden on our intelligence services that they cannot possibly meet.
“Intelligence and law enforcement agencies shall be able to carry out real time tactical interception in order to disrupt, interdict or prevent terrorist and criminal activity, as effectively as they do now.”
We would all hope that that is the case, as it is essential that the security services are able to do their work, particularly when it is possible to prevent a catastrophic event happening. We do not want them looking over their shoulder to consider what we have passed in this Committee, or elsewhere, and that getting in the way of their work.
“Law enforcement agencies shall be able to use interception to provide strategic intelligence on criminal enterprises, and retain the intelligence sometimes for a number of years, regardless of the progress of specific criminal cases. Interception from the same lines may serve both tactical and strategic purposes; if it does, it shall be handled in a manner appropriate to both.”
Again, that is perfectly sensible.
“Intelligence agencies must be able to support law enforcement by carrying out interception, for “serious crime” purposes, of targets nominated by law enforcement, and to provide the product or reports on it to those agencies. Anything so provided shall be subject to the same disclosure obligations as other intelligence intercept.”
Again, that goes beyond the activities of a limited number of people who are engaged in terrorism, into a wider field of serious crime.
Lastly, the review stated:
“At trials (whether or not intercept is adduced as evidence) the defence shall not be able conduct successful ‘fishing expeditions’ against intercept alleged to be held by any agency.”
That is a major concern for the security services, but it is one that can be prevented by appropriate rules for the use and disclosure of the material in court.
The Chilcot review set out clearly the parameters in which the work should go forward. In the seminar, we heard that that work is going forward, and I was encouraged by that. I take what we were told at face value: that very serious consideration has been given to find an appropriate legal model, and that having designed such a legal model, it would be tested, and provided that it was tested and found to be appropriate, it would be implemented through the legislation.
We are well down the road, both in terms of intention and the work that has already been commissioned, in achieving our objective to ensure that intercept evidence is available as a further tool for investigation and prosecution. What remains to be determined is the time scale in which that work will proceed, and the legislative vehicle which will be used and whether that involves further delay.
The glib comment would be that we have a criminal justice Bill every year so there is certainly no problem in finding the legislative vehicle. It is a very rare year indeed when we do not have an array of Home Office and Ministry of Justice Bills to deal with, so I am certainly confident that there will be legislative vehicles. But I do need assurances from the Minister that a time scale is both envisaged and will be kept to for this. This is a very serious matter for many Members on both sides of the House, who really cannot understand why we should forgo such an effective evidential tool if there are ways of getting around the undoubted operational difficulties.
We need a very clear understanding that that work is not only proceeding but will reach a rapid conclusion, and that it is the clear intention of Ministers to make sure that that does happen rather than find ways for it not to happen—I am reassured on that. We need to be clear that there are no agencies who effectively have the veto on this process and can stymie what has been recommended, not just by those who consider it from the point of view of securing convictions, but those who are directly involved in gathering criminal intelligence—certainly on the police side—and can see the advantage of it. We need to set aside the reservations apparently expressed by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, and his view that this was going to be years hence, which, I have to say, was a very discouraging statement, and not in keeping with what we heard from the Home Office.

Dominic Grieve: I would say that it is mystifying when one compares it with the briefing we then had at the Home Office. It left me slightly with the sense that the Metropolitan Police Commissioner sometimes seems to say whatever comes into his head at the time.

David Heath: I must say that it is not the first time that I have been puzzled by evidence provided by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. He does seem to occasionally shoot from the hip and make comments which have not been fully considered. It worries me that he is not party to the work that is going ahead—at high speed—and that he is not aware that Ministers’ clear intention is to proceed in that way. If he is not party to that, then someone should take him aside and say “This is what is going on, Commissioner. Perhaps next time you make a public utterance on this issue, you might be a little more helpful to our processes, rather than suggesting quite the reverse of what we were told was the case in the seminar we attended.”
I do not want to go through the arguments in support of intercept evidence because both sides of the House have already agreed that this is where we intend to go. What remains are the legislative hurdles and the architecture of rules that need to be developed, tested and implemented. Our concern is that there is not yet any clarity about the timetable—thrown into sharp relief by the words of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. I therefore hope that we will hear clear assurances from the Minister in that respect.
If those assurances are not forthcoming, I will be tempted to support not my own new clause, which I do not intend to press to a Division, but the proposal from the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield, which provides a clear timetable for implementation, which is what everybody wants to see.

Dominic Grieve: As the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome rightly said, there is in reality very little difference between his amendment and my own. In its scope, it is to all intents and purposes identical on the schedule, and the only difference is the question whether it should be implemented now or later. I am on record on numerous occasions as saying that I wish to see intercept evidence introduced as soon as possible in terrorist cases. I agree with him that using it in cases of serious crime might also be beneficial. Even confining my remarks to the question of terrorism and terrorist cases, I see a powerful argument for wanting to have it introduced immediately, particularly because I have this sense of silence from the Government’s side about whether there was a serious intent to implement the Chilcot report.
In fairness to the Minister and to the Government, I found the briefing we received at the Home Office both illuminating and heartening. It seemed to me we had a clear indication that there was a strong desire to implement the recommendations, that work was taking place to bring about implementation and that we were dealing with a time frame rather than anything else. I recollect—I hope I remember this properly—that at one stage of the briefing we were told that a time frame of about a year to 18 months was being worked to.
For that reason, I selected 31 July 2010 as the date by which the regulations ought to come into force to implement the use of intercept evidence. I toyed with the idea of deferring it until 1 January 2011, but thought that that was probably too far away and wanted at least to stimulate debate on the feasibility of moving forward at a reasonable pace.
We are in danger of missing an opportunity in the passage of this legislation if we do not do something about this area. After all, the Government have already, in the legislation, done something about inquiries and inquests in relation to the use of intercept evidence. As the Minister acknowledged, that is in many ways a major step forward in the use of intercept material.
I accept that the problems associated with using intercept material in inquiries and inquests in the new form wanted by the Government are rather different from those that arise in the context of a criminal trial. However, I remain firmly of the view that the difficulties that undoubtedly exist are not insurmountable, and I have a compelling feeling of regret that this was not tackled properly four, five or six years ago when it became clear that the rise of a new kind of terrorism was going to require us to take sensible steps to try to ensure that we can bring to justice the perpetrators of outrages and those who are planning appalling offences.
The longer we delay doing it, the more we are forced to rely on administrative sanctions, whether it be control orders or the Belmarsh detention regime—all of which, as I think the Minister acknowledges, are flawed and unsatisfactory even if they may be necessary. That necessity should not blind us to the equal necessity of trying to do everything to get rid of those systems.
I am the first to accept that intercept evidence is not a panacea, because human intelligence—which is of course a very separate thing from intercept evidence—may often be the source of information that tells the Government what is going on. It remains a very difficult area to adduce in court, and therefore there may still remain cases where intercept evidence does not solve the problem. But the Government would be on much stronger ground in arguing for the administrative alternatives that they have put forward over the last five or six years if they were in a position to say that they had done everything in their power to bring within the umbrella of the criminal justice system powers to get convictions and there still remained a problem rather than the current position where they are unable to give that reassurance to the public or Parliament. For that reason, I strongly commend the introduction of intercept evidence.
There are very few western democracies where intercept evidence is not used. There are other common law jurisdictions where it is used. There is no compelling evidence from those countries that the use of that material is leading to serious problems for the intelligence and security services in collating and obtaining material. We live in a sophisticated age. If one wants to understand how intercept is carried out, there are all sort of places on the internet where one will find a mine of information. Some of it will be inaccurate, but some will be accurate. My feeling has always been that those who dabble in the fields of terrorism and serious crime are probably very well aware of where their communications are likely to be intercepted. Doubtless, as technology advances, there is always a hope from the intelligence services that they will keep one step ahead of their quarry.
We need to move forward and I hope that the Minister can give us some positive responses this afternoon so that we are in a better position on Report to evaluate some of the other difficult areas that the Government are arguing about. Whether or not we go down the road of 42-day pre-charge detention, to which I remain utterly opposed, the sooner intercept evidence can be used in court, the better.

Elfyn Llwyd: The first rule of advocacy is that one should not put a question to the witness unless one knows what answer will be received. When I put a question to Sir Ian Blair, I was flabbergasted at the response, not just at its content, but because it was delivered almost as if I was wasting everybody’s time in talking about intercept evidence. That contrasted dramatically with the Home Office briefing. I add my thanks for that facility having being made available to us. We had a candid and full exchange about the progress and the difficulties that need to be dealt with.
Like other Committee members, I feel that intercept evidence is vital. I, too, find it difficult to comprehend why other common law countries can use it without compromising sources. That is an important matter, which I have no doubt is uppermost in the minds of Home Office officials. I appended my name to new schedule 1 before we had the briefing and I take it that the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome will not press it to a vote because I would be slightly embarrassed, having heard from the Home Office officials.
The preferable proposal might be new schedule 4, which would impose a time frame. I echo what the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield said on that. Lord Carlile in effect said that this is not a silver bullet, but part of the armoury. It will help in many cases, but not in all. We should have it in the armoury because of the seriousness of the threat. I was encouraged by what I heard in the Home Office and I have no reason to doubt what was said. I hope that in applying what the officials candidly described to us, the Minister will look favourably on new schedule 4. It allows a longer period than was anticipated by officials, within which pilot schemes and the necessary investigations will have been concluded. I support the idea advanced by the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome, but it has been somewhat overtaken by events. I encourage the Minister to look carefully at new schedule 4.

Tony McNulty: I am grateful to hon. Members for their appreciation of the seminar, which was clearly illuminating. I shall be having words later with officials. If they were far too candid and open, they will not be doing it again. In all seriousness, I am grateful to them for making it so open and candid that people could understand what is happening. None the less, I should make clear where we are.
A cross-party group deliberated extensively on the matter and reported to the House last summer. The Prime Minister fully accepted what the Chilcot report said. As hon. Members will have heard, fairly soon thereafter an implementation group, or whatever it is called, was set to work on the not inconsiderable barriers to which Chilcot referred. It was a long and daunting list, but the starting premise was that if we could get there, we should.
I cannot accept the reheated amendment of Lord Lloyd of Berwick tabled by the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome because, counter to Chilcot, it relies upon public interest immunity. Chilcot clearly said that he was not convinced—actually, he went much further—that PII in its current form was appropriate. He spoke of a PII-plus system, which is part of what is being worked upon. There must be something about Berwick: we had the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) on the Committee and Lord Lloyd of Berwick in the other place. The amendment is premature, to say the least, and it should be resisted. If permitted and implemented, it would result in a far worse position than that which Chilcot, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed and others have suggested is the position that we need to get to. In that context, I would also resist the new schedule.
I hope that it was made clear at the Home Office seminar that, in discussion with Chilcot, the 2009-10 Session is precisely when we hope to legislate on the matter. However, that rather presumes that all the work will have been done and that all the areas that we hope to have dispatched, and all the road blocks and obstacles that we need to have overcome are overcome and dispatched. I do not know when that will be; nor, with respect, does the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield. I do not want to hold the Government to a date, as I simply do not know whether it can be met. 
I am not entirely sure what formulation will be put in place to ensure that the House is kept broadly up to date with the progress of the Chilcot advisory group. I shall certainly take that matter away and explore it. It is a sensitive and serious issue. The Prime Minister has made a significant statement on it. We have set up the group. It is not necessary to let the House know every nook and cranny, every detail, of its work and deliberations, but it is only fair to have a system in place to tell the House what level of progress is being made.

Martin Salter: Does the Minister agree that there is a danger of hon. Members appearing churlish, given the growing consensus about intercept evidence in the House and the Committee? The Home Affairs Committee recommended it, and in evidence to that Committee, Assistant Commissioner Hayman said that he believed that there is a case for its use. We do not need to overcomplicate the matter. Policy is moving precisely in the right direction.

Tony McNulty: I entirely agree. I have never known my hon. Friend to be churlish, so there was no need for him to make that qualification at the start of his intervention.
We are on course. As I said—I happily repeat it—the work programme now under way will be consistent with legislation if the operational tests can be met. I do not diminish the seriousness of those operational and legal tests, but we expect to debate the matter during the 2009-10 Session. We believe that the issues raised by Chilcot should be capable of resolution, but there is no guarantee that they will be met without a significant further reworking of the model—or met at all. As my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West implied, the new clause would completely pre-empt that, being inconsistent not only with the Government’s position or that of the respective select committees, but also with the cross-party Chilcot report itself. It is unnecessary either to lock us into a date that no one in this House or Committee knows whether we can keep——I repeat the assurance that we seek to achieve it by 2009-10, all going well—or into what is clearly, according to Lord Lloyd of Berwick, an inferior model that relies on a PII system that Lord Chilcot has traduced himself.

David Heath: Not “Lord”.

Tony McNulty: Oops—maybe I have given something away there.
It is not a sufficient legal framework to build such a process on, if all the operational matters do come to fruition. But let us be very clear: the points—not made churlishly—about Blair were relevant. Actually, Blair has been one of the loudest and most vociferous proponents of intercept as evidence, as in his Berlin speech about six to nine months ago, which at the time was much to my annoyance, but with which now, of course, I wholeheartedly agree. If he was confused at our session, then that was a lack, but an uncharacteristic lack. He has made very clear, as did Andy Hayman, the previous head of anti-terrorism, as my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West pointed out, that they favour intercept evidence.
Let us be very clear. It is not the panacea. On the closest parallel we have had, and I think Lord Chilcot referred to this, in US and UK cases that were roughly comparable in their use of intercept, the highest arrest to conviction rate as a result of interception between 1996 and 2006 in the US was 56.4 per cent. In the UK, a Metropolitan police study of operations carried out in 2006-07 involving intercept intelligence only, found there was an 88 per cent. charge to conviction rate of completed cases.
The argument put that somehow we are lacking in our prosecutorial system because we do not use intercept as evidence is not as black and white as people imagine. Because we do not use intercept as evidence, there is far, far more that our intelligence and law enforcement people do together in the pursuit of crime, and terrorist crime in particular, that they would not do if intercept as evidence were introduced. I am not offering that as an objection to bringing intercept evidence in; I am simply saying it is not the black and white position people imply.
The Chilcot report itself highlighted that, in a review of nine current or former control order cases conducted by independent senior criminal counsel, the ability to use intercept material in evidence would not have enabled a criminal prosecution to be brought in any of the case studies. I am not saying this of the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield or the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome—though there are plenty in his ranks—but there are those who have said that, with intercept evidence and post-charge questioning, there would in an instant be no need for pre-charge detention or control orders. That is simply far too simplistic. I do not want to cast aspersions on anyone in particular in the hon. Gentleman’s ranks, but he need look no further than his right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr. Clegg), who has made that point on a number of occasions. It completely misconstrues the import of what we are discussing. Will it help? It may. I would put it no stronger than that.
People need to understand very clearly the distinction between communication data, bugging and the use of intercept evidence, which I am sure everyone here does. I do not think the distinction between those is quite so clear-cut out in the real world, and that adds to the confusion.
Let us take a simple bug put in a car or in somebody’s room. All of a sudden, when the court case comes, we get the transcript and hear the tape, and people will say “I thought we did not use intercept evidence.” It goes to the provenance of the location of the intelligence. A bug in a car is easily dealt with in terms of going back to the source, but some elements of intercept, and how we got it, will not be. That will not be fixed by Chilcot either, by the way.
Communications data are used all the time as well. In court cases, we see the police have gone through people’s phone records and everything else, linking who people have been talking to—not the substance or detail of any of the conversations, but simply the traffic. The same applies to e-mail.
The closer we get to the implementation of Chilcot——not on the back of this Bill, I hasten to add—the more there needs to be further discussion about what we mean by intercept as evidence. I would not want to diminish what especially US law enforcement can do but while more often than not, they are very enthusiastic about it, they tell you in the next breath that in most of the serious crime cases—terrorism, less so—they have cracked using intercept as evidence have involved intercepted evidence right from the beginning of the process. This is why cases are run increasingly on a sting basis and why much of what gets through the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organisations Act and other legislation uses intercept as part of the investigatory process rather than simply as part of the discovery.
The Chilcot review discussed all that. I say that to reinforce the point that it is not the panacea that people suggest. Cases have been studied—including the one referred to by the hon. and learned Gentleman—as part of a review of intercept as evidence. I cannot say, hand on heart, in every significant case of terrorism over the last five to eight years intercept as evidence would not have been of use. Intercept has been of enormous use but it is not fair to imply that we have fought and disrupted those plots in a deficient way because of the absence of intercept as evidence. One cannot claim that causality given what has come to court and the success we have had through the courts.
Will it, like all the other elements of this Bill, add to the array of devices and activities we have in the fight against terrorism? It will. The sooner we get there, the better. At the very least, the sooner we get to see whether all that Chilcot describes as impediments can be overcome and then legislate, the better. We are at one with that.
These new clauses and schedules are premature given the processes that are unfolding and I ask that they be resisted.

David Heath: This is an important issue. The Minister is right that this is one element among a range of tools that should be available. No one has ever suggested that it is the one tool which is going to be efficacious when nothing else is. It is part of an array which we have been assembling in order to fight terrorism effectively. It is reasonable that we argue that when we have all the elements in place we can question whether other less satisfactory suggestions are required. That is the basis of the argument on 42 days or any other extension of pre-charge questioning but that is a debate we have had and will have and not the one we are engaged in now.
The Minister is also right to say there is widespread confusion about what we mean by intercept evidence. That is one reason people are very confused; not because they think all intercept evidence is not admissible but because they know that some is. They question why when one bit of electronic kit picks up evidence it can be put in front of a court but when another bit of electronic kit picks up the same conversation it cannot be. That has added to the confusion and the sense that this is not a sensible position to be in.
I said earlier that the matter has ramifications beyond terrorist cases. It is also an important weapon in fighting serious organised crime. An Italian Government official recently asked me, unofficially, why on earth we do not allow intercept evidence, as it is a crucial part of the fight against organised crime in his country. Of course, they have some experience of fighting organised crime. There are anomalies, such as allowing some types of intercept evidence to be admissible in court but not others, or the fact that other democracies, including those with a common law jurisdiction, can apparently get round the problems that prove so difficult for us to deal with. There is a nagging suspicion that although this is not a panacea or silver bullet—one could use all the clichÃ(c)s that can be adduced—it is nevertheless an important tool within the array, and it should be possible to deploy it. For a long time, all those arguments hit a brick wall. There was simply no question of the admissibility of intercept evidence because important and highly placed officials within the security services advised against it. We are entitled to take that into account when assessing the present progress, which I agree is entirely to be welcomed.

Tony McNulty: Lord Goldsmith conducted a considerable review of that in the not-too-distant past, and although I cannot remember the names involved, I am pretty sure that there has been, at least under the Thatcher Government, some exploration of utilising the two. Even though those have not gone on to fruition or been as public as the Chilcot review, it is unfair to say that previous Governments have not explored in some detail the potential use of intercept evidence.

David Heath: If I gave that impression, I will quickly dispel it. I know that previous Governments, and indeed this Government, have looked carefully at that issue in the past, but they have always concluded that it cannot proceed, and that is why the Chilcot review and the work that has come from it is now welcome. However, I do not think that it is entirely right to use that right parliamentary expression, “churlish”. When do we ever say “churlish” outside of the House? Never, but when one expresses the mildest disagreement with any other Member, one is accused of being churlish. It is not churlish to say that although the progress is now welcome, it has been a long time coming and we have been pushing this case hard for a long time. Among those pushing for that case has been Lord Lloyd of Berwick, along with many noble Members in another place who have been completely convinced of the merits of the case but who have so far been repulsed.
I am confident that we are making progress, and the Minister has said he has a clear timetable in mind. I understand that he cannot commit to that because it is a work in progress and new difficulties might be discovered. Members of the Committee are entitled to ask for those commitments, and the Minister said earlier that he must find a way of telling the House how progress is being maintained, which will be very important. It would reassure many Members who feel strongly about that if a factual report on progress could be presented to the House in some form that is yet to be devised.

Douglas Hogg: Might I suggest that a good way for the Minister to keep us informed would be an undertaking to give an oral statement before the House rises for the summer recess?

David Heath: I am not sure that it is entirely within the gift of a Minister of State to give that undertaking, but it would be extremely helpful. The Minister might want to refer that back to the Home Secretary as something that would be of value. Given that I anticipate that we will reach Report stage before the summer recess, we need to find an opportunity on Report for the sort of report that the Minister gave today to be updated to take into account work between now and then. I hope that we are in any way overplaying our hand on this issue, given the agreement on all sides to try to make progress, if we find a vehicle through amendment that would enable that report to the House to be made.

Tom Brake: Does my hon. Friend agree that when the Minister reports, in whatever form he chooses to do so, he should also update us on cost? That was one of the factors that the Committee briefing identified as a possible obstacle to the use of intercept evidence.

David Heath: I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I am glad that he is now freed of the requirement to speak on anti-Semitism in the Chamber and can rejoin the Committee. He has touched on one of a number of points that were addressed in the seminar about which it would be useful to hear progress, but let us do so in the spirit that we are now making progress and that hon. Members on all sides now wish to see the measure put in place—at least that is the assumption that I make from the tenor of today’s debate.
I do not intend to press the new clause because it has been overtaken by events. The Minister is right that the formulation used by the Lord Berwick, which was useful and has served to enable the debate, is likely to be superseded by a more sophisticated model in the work that he has already indicated is going ahead. That being the case, I shall seek to withdraw the new clause, but it is important that we have had this debate and that we commit ourselves to adding the measure to the armoury of weapons available to the investigating and prosecuting authorities in terrorism cases. Until we have it on the statute book, whatever the Minister says about the limited application, we are deficient in what is available and that is regrettable. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 5

Proscribed organisations
‘(1) Section 3 of the Terrorism Act 2000 (c. 11) (proscription) is amended as follows.
(2) In subsection (5) after paragraph (d) insert—
“(e) has been involved in support or acts of terrorism.”’.—[Mr. Grieve.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Dominic Grieve: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Edward O'Hara: With this it will be convenient to discuss
New clause 11—Proscribed organisations (No. 2)
‘(1) Section 3 of the Terrorism Act 2000 (c. 11) is amended as follows.
(2) In subsection (5) after paragraph (d) insert—
“(e) has been involved in support or acts of terrorism and has not unequivocally renounced support of terrorism.”.’.

Dominic Grieve: The Bill’s passage offers us an opportunity to look at other aspects of previous terrorism Acts, particularly the Terrorism Act 2000, in respect of proscribed organisations. The Minister will be aware that there has been some anxiety expressed in the House that, in the past, Ministers, including the last Prime Minister, indicated the necessity, or desirability at least, of proscribing certain organisations that were linked to terrorism, but having the told House that action would be taken, nothing has happened and it has gradually emerged that there are doubts about whether the organisations concerned fit the bill for proscription. In one case the arguments advanced in the Commons have centred around Hizb ut-Tahrir and its association with terrorism. The concerns expressed about that have not, however, led to it being banned.
It seems that when one considers the wording of the Terrorism Act 2000, it is at least arguable that it does not deal adequately with organisations that have in the past supported terrorism—and in some circumstances actively carried it out—but have successfully stepped to one side for the purpose of maintaining their public credibility and maintained a stark ambiguity as to their present status. For that reason, we thought it right for the purposes of stimulating debate to table two possible models for dealing with the problem, one of which would allow the proscription of an organisation that has been involved in support or acts of terrorism—new clause 5. Having tabled that, I was concerned about it because it seemed to me that it was capable of drawing the net too widely, particularly because it would, for example, catch organisations such as Sinn Fein which have undoubtedly supported terrorism in the past but have now unequivocally abandoned it.
The better model we might therefore choose to follow is that in new clause 11 which adds—this is my preferred model—to the words of new clause 5
“has been involved in support or acts of terrorism and has not unequivocally renounced support of terrorism”.
If we were to adopt such a model it seems that organisations that have, in many cases, a proven link with terrorism, but have not acquired an ambiguous status which often appears to be entirely deliberate, could, if necessary be put on the proscribed list by the Government.
I am aware that arguments are sometimes advanced that it is better not to proscribe organisations because it keeps them out in the open. There are some intelligence and policing advantages from doing so, but nevertheless we have a number of organisations, some of which are located in this country, with agendas that appear to be extremely closely associated with terrorism.
In seeking to put this forward, I do not in any way wish to suggest that it is not possible for organisations to change their spots. After all, the Government have just lost a case concerning an organisation linked to Iran. I have taken the view over the past two years that there was quite compelling evidence to suggest that it was no longer associated with terrorism at all, and it appears to have satisfied a court of that fact, although the Government remain unhappy about that and are appealing the matter. I shall not touch on that further; I simply put it forward as an illustration of one of the sorts of areas that we have to look at.
Leaving that particular example to one side, the amendment in new clause 11 would be neutral in that case. If an organisation can show that it has unequivocally renounced terrorism, is not actively supporting it, or carrying out acts of terrorism, there would be no grounds for its proscription. But if it could still be shown that they have displayed a continuing ambivalence when, in the past, they have either supported terrorism or perpetrated acts of terrorism themselves, it would provide the Government with an extra weapon by which it could, if necessary, bring a motion for proscription before the House of Commons.

Tom Brake: The hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield was right to say that new clause 5 was too widely drafted. However, perhaps some of the concerns we have about new clause 5 are equally applicable to new clause 11 in terms of an organisation being able to demonstrate that it
“has not unequivocally renounced support of terrorism”.
I do not know whether there is a legal definition for unequivocally renouncing something. I assume that there is not. Therefore to be able to demonstrate that, for example, the leading lights of an organisation have unequivocally renounced support for terrorism but individual members have not, just as with new clause 5, there are concerns about the drafting of that and how broad it is. Because of our concerns about being able to demonstrate how an organisation has unequivocally renounced support of terrorism, should the hon. and learned Gentleman be minded to press the matter to a vote, we will not be supporting him.

Dominic Grieve: The purpose of this new clause is not only to stimulate debate and to listen to what the Minister has to say; it goes beyond that. I took the words “unequivocally renounced” because those were the words used in the context of the Northern Ireland peace process about the IRA and Sinn Fein. Although it can clearly always remain a subject of debate and polemic, there came a point where it became fairly apparent that there had been an unequivocal renunciation. That seemed to be as good a term as I was likely to find.

Tom Brake: I thank the hon. and learned Gentleman for explaining that. He made a good choice. However, what is also illustrated is that in arriving at the point where it was agreed that Sinn Fein had unequivocally renounced support for terrorism, there were a large number of staging posts along the way where some argued that it had, and others that it had not. Because of the problems about agreeing where the point of unequivocal renunciation arises, we are not inclined to support the measure.

Douglas Hogg: Does not the new clause have one great advantage? If, for example, the Government were minded to proscribe an organisation, and that organisation considered that it fell within the exemption as it had renounced terrorism, the process of proscription would enable that organisation to demonstrate that it had indeed renounced it. To that extent, it would be a helpful process.

Tom Brake: From a sedentary position my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome says that it widens the scope rather than narrowing it.

David Heath: It worries me that this widens the possibility of proscription. I rarely say that Ministers should be given the benefit of the doubt, but when they are in possession of the intelligence reports and the advice of the police agencies, they can make an assessment about whether an organisation is engaged in terrorism or is a supporter of it. The new clauses do not add anything other than encouraging the view that a national clamour through the press, or through MPs, can apply pressure on Ministers to proscribe an organisation that their intelligence tells them should not be proscribed.

Tom Brake: My hon. Friend and others have demonstrated that the official Opposition spokesman has achieved his aims in terms of engaging in a debate about this matter, and we will all listen carefully to what the Minister says in response.

Tony McNulty: I want to thank two Conservative members who approached me on this matter some time ago, asking whether this might be an appropriate occasion to explore it. I am grateful to them, particularly—without being invidious and naming names—to the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyrewho spoke to me some time ago, and fair play to him. The only problem was timing—not his, but timing more generally.
The hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield quite fairly pointed out that we have just had a recent judgment from the Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission with regard to the People’s Mujahedeen Organisation of Iran, on which we are appealing. As a result of both the Court of Appeal judgment, which we now have, and the original POAC judgment, we may seek to make some changes to the law on proscription in the Bill on Report. New clause 11, rather than new clause 5—as the hon. and learned Gentleman rightly said—might be worthy of consideration. I agree with him that even if the wrong organisation is captured, were this to be part of such an amendment on Report, the process would be that organisation’s opportunity to renounce as fully as possible. [Interruption.] I know that we lost the appeal, I have worked that out. I was referring to reviewing the Court of Appeal judgment as well as POAC’s original judgment. I am painfully aware that we have lost. We are at an appropriate stage to review both elements of those documents and the entire architecture of the proscription legislation, and as part of that review process, I undertake to take the import of new clause 11 away and, if appropriate, to come back on Report with a conclusion to our deliberations on what is a very serious new clause. Again I am grateful that it has been tabled, but I should like it to be un-tabled.

Dominic Grieve: I shall satisfy the Minister by un-tabling it, if that is the correct terminology, although I have some slight doubt about that. The Minister’s demotic adds richly to the proceedings of the Committee. This is an important issue. New clause 11 could well provide the basis of a formula that could be of considerable assistance to the Government in dealing with some organisations on the fringes of terrorism, in cases where there seems to be a considerable amount of evidence that they are fellow travellers with terrorism, even if they have found it convenient for their own purposes to step to one side and claim that their hands are clean. For those reasons, I very much hope that the Minister’s assurance is that the issue has not been lost sight of and can be returned to, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 8

Plea negotiation
‘(1) The Secretary of State must, within 12 months of the passing of this Act, make regulations which make provision for the use of plea negotiation for defendants charged with terrorism offences or offences with a terrorist connection.
(2) Regulations made under subsection (1) may provide for the circumstances in which defendants can mitigate their sentence by pleading guilty at trial.
(3) The Secretary of State may before making regulations under subsection (1), consult such organisation as she considers appropriate.’.—[Mr. Hogg.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Douglas Hogg: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
I rather regret that my hon. Friend the Member for Newark is not here, because this was very much his new clause. I have not discussed new clause 8 with him, so I do not entirely know what was in his mind, and these are rather more my observations than they are his.
Subsection (2) is of course in accordance with judge-made law as it is, namely that defendants who plead guilty at the earliest possible opportunity can achieve a discount in their sentence. In my view, that is wholly right. The maximum is about one third for the earliest possible indication of a plea of guilty. I think that that is right and should apply to terrorist offences as to any other.
Subsection (1) could apply not just to a terrorism Bill, but to any criminal justice Bill, because there is considerable merit in allowing pre-trial plea bargaining. As a matter of fact, pre-trial plea bargaining has existed for a very long time and still exists—and a very good thing too. There is very frequently discussion between defence and prosecution counsel as to what plea might be acceptable. Very often, too, one can go to the judge and gain an indication as to what would be the appropriate sentence on the basis of an agreed set of facts.
There probably is merit in some statutory or quasi-statutory framework, and there are one or two things that have to be provided for within such a framework. First, there must be some provision whereby a defendant’s interests cannot be prejudiced. I have known of a number of cases where defendants have been advised of the desirability of pleading guilty, have indicated a willingness to do so, and then start ratting on the deal. Everybody is rather shafted by that process, so one does have to address it so that the defendant is not misled and, incidentally, other people are not prejudiced by the defendant subsequently ratting.
It is also very important to ensure that there is an agreed basis for the plea, and the process has to be worked out. If necessary, there may have to be what is referred to as a Newton trial or a Newton process to determine the basic facts. That needs to be provided for in the regulations, as does a process whereby the judge is brought into the discussion so that he can give a fairly binding indication of what the appropriate sentence would be. Those matters all have to be addressed by the regulations, and other criteria too may need to be incorporated, but that there should be a process of pre-trial plea bargaining seems quite plain. I see no reason why it should be confined to terrorism, and it is probably a good thing to give it a quasi-statutory basis, and I commend the motion to the Committee.

Tony McNulty: I, too, am rather disappointed that the hon. Member for Newark is not here because I know that this is a subject that exercises him. There may be some merit in exploring it further, but not in the context of this new clause. As the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham has said, either it rather lamely describes what already prevails, in circumstances such as R v. Goodyear, or—I am not sure whether this is in the mind of the hon. Member for Newark—if it aims to allow prosecutors to accept a plea on a lesser charge than is justified by the alleged offending, the new clause is objectionable in principle. If he is trying to go for the full-on American-type system, as I described earlier, we object to it in principle.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman will know that we are looking closely at the results of a plea negotiation framework for fraud cases, which is quite separate from this Bill. If that comes up with any ideas in the area of plea negotiation that we think will be useful in combating terrorism, we will take them forward. He quite reasonably says that there is already a plea negotiation process in our due process and I am not sure how much beyond that the hon. Gentleman was seeking to go.
I will explore the idea further, taking into consideration the framework for fraud cases. I do not know whether I will be able to say anything further on the matter on Report, but it may well be in the Committee’s interests for the motion to be withdrawn. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will be allowed to enlighten us on Report. I have some sympathy with the thrust of the new clause, but I do not agree with the intent as it has been perceived in the hon. Gentleman’s absence. I ask that the motion be withdrawn.

Douglas Hogg: I shall withdraw the motion and I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Newark will have an opportunity on Report to deal with the matter. I will, however, make two brief comments. First, I do not dismiss as rapidly as the Minister the proposition that one should be able to accept a plea for an offence less than that which the evidence discloses. There is sometimes merit in accepting pleas for lesser offences. Never forget that by doing so one is sparing witnesses the trauma of giving evidence and saving a huge amount of money. It is sometimes pretty artificial whether a person is charged with A or B. There is a discretion and sometimes there is merit in not charging for the maximum offence. I hope that the Minister will not be quite so dismissive of that proposition.
Secondly and differently, while I welcome the fact that plea bargaining considerations are taking place in the context of fraud cases, I hope that the Minister will not turn his face from widening the scope of any changes that are brought forward to include offences other than fraud. Truth to say, while fraud is a recognisable category, the issues revolving around fraud, other than the evidential problems, are not in any sense sui generis. I would have thought that if one was going to approve a process for plea bargaining in relation to fraud cases, it is very difficult to see why it should not be extended across the spectrum of criminal law. I hope that he will take a rather more flexible approach than his intervention indicated. Subject to those two observations, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 13

Applications for inquests to be held without a jury
‘(1) In section 8 of the Coroners Act 1988 (c. 13) (duty to hold inquest), after subsection (7) insert—
“(8) This section is subject to section 8A (applications for inquests to be held without a jury).”.
(2) After that section insert—
“8A Certificate requiring inquest to be held without a jury
(1) The Secretary of State may apply to the Lord Chief Justice for an inquest to be held without a jury if it is—
(a) in the interests of national security,
(b) in the interests of the relationship between the United Kingdom and another country, or
(c) otherwise in the public interest.
(2) The Lord Chief Justice may grant an application made under subsection (1) if he is satisfied that any of paragraphs (a) to (c) apply.
(3) Where an application under subsection (2) has been granted, the inquest must be held without a jury, so that—
(a) if a jury has not been summoned, the coroner must not summon a jury, and
(b) if a jury has been summoned, the coroner must discharge the jury.
(4) Accordingly, the following do not apply in relation to the inquest—
(a) the power under subsection (1) or (4) of section 8 to hold the inquest or part of the inquest with a jury, and
(b) the duty under subsection (3) of that section to hold the inquest with a jury in the circumstances set out in that subsection.
(5) If a jury is summoned—
(a) the coroner must proceed in all respects as if the inquest had not previously begun, and
(b) the provisions of this Act apply accordingly as if that were the case.”.
(3) This section has effect in relation to inquests that have begun, but have not been concluded, before the day on which it comes into force as well as to inquests beginning on or after that day.’.—[Mr. Grieve.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Dominic Grieve: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
This is the last of the new clauses that we have to consider. It follows on in many ways from the debate that we had on Tuesday so I need not take up too much of the Committee’s time. It offers the Government the opportunity to look at a formula that provides, by relatively minor tweaking of the Bill, for the Secretary of State to make an application to the Lord Chief Justice for an inquest to be held without a jury rather than a certificate being issued, as is proposed by the Government. I hope that in the 48 hours since we last debated this matter, the Minister will have been tempted into a greater understanding of how important it is that any changes to the coroners inquest process to allow the use of intercept and intelligence evidence should be subject to judicial discretion.
If the Government are right—and the Minister made a powerful case on Tuesday—as to the necessity in some cases of abandoning the current inquisitorial system with a jury because of the advantage of putting material in front of a coroner that will be conclusive and very helpful, at least to the coroner coming up with the right answers to what happened, then persuading a court of the necessity of departing from the current practice, appears to be the absolute foundation for doing that.
I am perfectly satisfied that the Government may be able to tell me, even today, that the new clause is flawed in a number of technical respects—for which I can only apologise, I did my best to redraft it as I could—it nevertheless allows for such a model. If that model were also linked to the obvious safeguards—which we were asked for but which I have not sought to tackle in new clause 13—needed for the appointment of coroners themselves, that will already start to go a very long way indeed to meeting some of the anxieties expressed. I obviously reserve my position on this as to whether we would have to continue our opposition.
I am aware that there is one area in the course of the passage of this Bill—42 days pre-charge detention—where I suspect that a meeting of minds will remain absolutely impossible for a variety of reasons. But I have to say that on this matter, which in a sense took us by surprise, there is a danger of there being substantial disagreement leading to us seeking to remove this part of the Bill entirely on Report. Certainly I wonder whether it will survive in the other place in its present form—I think it most unlikely. The Government will have to take urgent steps to persuade the House of Commons, and ultimately to persuade the House of Lords, that the changes they are bringing about have adequate safeguards and will not prejudice the complete review in the course of the coroners Bill, which, since the Prime Minister’s announcement yesterday, we now know we are going to be getting next year. It would be much better if all of this could be put off until the coroners Bill, particularly in light of what the Government have said. In that case, I would urge the Minister not to go down the road of new clause 13, but simply to take the opportunity on Report to remove the references to inquests in the Bill with an assurance that the House will return to the matter in the course of next year. That would be my preferred course. I have been trying to show the Minister a common road that we can follow, because I am mindful of the fact that the Minister has raised an important issue here, and the Home Office briefing made me realise its importance. At the same time, the protections afforded by coroners inquests and juries should not be allowed to be forfeited or removed lightly.

Douglas Hogg: I rise to support new clause 13. I really have only three observations to make. First, I agree with what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield said about the coroners Bill. The changes in this part of the Bill are much better placed in the context of a coroners Bill and I would be content if we did not deal with it in this Bill at all.
Secondly, and differently, for the reasons that I previously advanced earlier, I do not believe that the public will ever be content with a process whereby the Secretary of State, acting alone and through certificate, can prevent a hearing before a jury. I do not think that the public will accept that, and I think the public would be right not to accept it. That being so, if we are going to go down this road at all, we have to find some other process whereby the certificate is issued.
I believe—it was in my amendments that we discussed some time ago—that the role of the Lord Chief Justice would provide the necessary reassurance. I think my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield is to be congratulated on the way in which he has drafted his new clause, subject to the third point that I am going to make.
I find it very difficult to believe that I will ever be persuaded that the phrase “otherwise in the public interest” should form part of the criteria. We debated this some time ago when I set out the reasons why I am against it and I will not repeat them today. It is far too wide.

Dominic Grieve: I agree with my right hon. and learned Friend. Having tabled the new clause, I rather regretted that I had not sought further to change the original text.
There are strong arguments, particularly in the context of this debate, for the criteria to be either the interests of national security or some other overwhelming reason, given the need to allow intercept evidence to be adduced. The criteria should include nothing else, and certainly not the interests of the relationship between the United Kingdom and another country, which has always struck me as one of the more bizarre aspects of the proposal.

Douglas Hogg: I am grateful to my hon. and learned Friend for making that point. We are as one on this matter.
I hope that the Minister will take the matter away and examine whether another formula can be arrived at, either for this Bill or the coroners Bill. I, and I suspect most of my party, have enormous difficulty with any proposal that allows the Secretary of State to issue the certificate or which allows such criteria.

Elfyn Llwyd: I remind the Committee that the Attorney-General’s general guidelines in respect of every prosecution contain a public interest element. Why do we need the provision expressly in the Bill? It seems unnecessary. Are we to take it that there are different sets of public interest considerations from the ordinary ones of the Attorney-General’s guidelines?

Douglas Hogg: I suspect that the answer is that once the provision is in the Bill it is capable of a wider interpretation. The point is fairly raised, but I do not know the answer. Perhaps the Minister does. The phrase is very wide and, as it has such dramatic consequences, I would be reluctant to give it any kind of tacit support.

David Heath: I was going to say that we had already debated this new clause and therefore it was unnecessary to replicate the arguments, save for a reservation, which the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham has now expressed. I still cannot be doing with subsection (1)(b) and (c)—I regretted that it was included in the new clause, but apparently the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield does too, so we are at one.
As the hon. and learned Gentleman has said, we are capable of finding a resolution on this issue if the Government are so disposed. If we do not, it is unlikely that the provision will make it through both Houses. There is still the option of using the coroners Bill as the vehicle, which will occasion a delay, but perhaps not an insurmountable one.
If we want to go ahead now, two issues need to be addressed. One is the certification by a Secretary of State that a matter can be held without a jury without judicial oversight or involvement. The second, which I find reprehensible, is the suggestion that a Secretary of State should appoint a special coroner, rather than the appointment being subject to judicial independence.
If we can deal with both issues—the hon. and learned Gentleman’s new clause deals with one of them—then we are a long way towards a meeting of minds. I hope that the Minister will accept the spirit of the new clause as proposed and supported from the Opposition Benches, and that he will find a suitable resolution.

Tony McNulty: No, I do not accept it, but I appreciate that this mini-debate and our debate on Tuesday have shown that the Committee recognises the need for a resolution. I said then that I would take away part 6 and have a look at its architecture, and that must continue to be my refrain. I take very seriously the notion that we should be able to move forward on a consensual basis. I am told that there is at least one and possibly other compelling cases that mean that we should do this now rather than wait for the now publicly flaunted coroners Bill in the next Session.
I also made the point—I am not sure whether it was in Committee or outside it—that were something of that order to pass in part 6, a very strong link would be made to it eventually being subsumed into the coroners reform Bill. That is perfectly logical. I am up for getting us all to a stage where, having agreed that there is an issue, we can overcome it. I will reflect on this and other sections of part 6 and potentially discuss them further with Committee members before Report.
In that context, I ask that the new clause be withdrawn.

Dominic Grieve: I look forward to hearing in due course how the Minister intends to tackle this difficult problem. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Schedule 2

Disclosure and the intelligence services: consequential amendments

Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 (c. 24)
1 In section 19(2) of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 (disclosure of information held by revenue departments), omit paragraph (a).

Representation of the People (England and Wales) Regulations 2001 (S.I. 2001/341)
2 (1) The Representation of the People (England and Wales) Regulations 2001 are amended as follows.
(2) In regulation 45E (supply of record of anonymous entries to the security services), omit paragraphs (3) and (4).
(3) In regulation 102(6) (supply of full register: general restrictions on use), for “regulations 103 to 109” substitute “regulations 103 to 108 or 109”.
(4) After regulation 108 insert—
“108A Supply of full register etc to the security services
(1) This regulation applies to—
(a) the Security Service;
(b) the Government Communications Headquarters;
(c) the Secret Intelligence Service.
(2) For the purposes of regulation 102(1) above the relevant part of the documents listed in that provision is the whole of them.”.
(5) In regulation 109 (supply of full register etc to police force and other agencies and restrictions on use), omit—
(a) paragraph (1)(g) to (i);
(b) in paragraph (4)(a), the words preceding paragraph (i);
(c) paragraph (4)(b) and the word “and” immediately preceding it.
(6) In regulation 113 (sale of full register to government departments and other bodies)—
(a) in the closing words of paragraph (1), after “other than” insert “a department to which regulation 108A applies or”;
(b) in paragraph (3) for “regulation 109(1)(g) to (i),” substitute “regulation 108A”.
(7) In regulation 115(2) (offences) omit “45E(3),”.
(8) For regulation 118(8) (provision of copies of documents open to public inspection) substitute insert—
“(8) The relevant registration officer shall, on request, supply free of charge copies of any documents open to public inspection—
(a) to each of the departments mentioned in regulation 108A;
(b) to a person who has inspected those documents and who is entitled to be supplied with a copy of the marked register or lists by virtue of being a person to whom regulation 109 applies.”.
(9) In regulation 119(3) for “regulation 118(8)” substitute “regulation 118(8)(b)”.

Representation of the People (Scotland) Regulations 2001 (S.I. 2001/497)
3 (1) The Representation of the People (Scotland) Regulations 2001 are amended as follows.
(2) In regulation 45D (supply of record of anonymous entries to the security services), omit paragraphs (3) and (4).
(3) In regulation 101(6) (supply of full register: general restrictions on use), for “regulations 102 to 108” substitute “regulations 102 to 107 or 108”.
(4) After regulation 107 insert—
“107A Supply of full register etc to the security services
(1) This regulation applies to—
(a) the Security Service;
(b) the Government Communications Headquarters;
(c) the Secret Intelligence Service.
(2) For the purposes of regulation 101(1) above the relevant part of the documents listed in that provision is the whole of them.”.
(5) In regulation 108 (supply of full register etc to police force and other agencies and restrictions on use), omit—
(a) paragraph (1)(g) to (i);
(b) in paragraph (4)(a), the words preceding paragraph (i);
(c) paragraph (4)(b) and the word “and” immediately preceding it.
(6) In regulation 112 (sale of full register to government departments and other bodies)—
(a) in the closing words of paragraph (1), after “other than” insert “a department to which regulation 107A applies or”;
(b) in paragraph (3) for “regulation 108(1)(g) to (i),” substitute “regulation 107A”.
(7) In regulation 115(2) (offences) omit “45D(3),”.
(8) For regulation 118(8) (provision of copies of documents open to public inspection) substitute insert—
“(8) The relevant registration officer shall, on request, supply free of charge copies of any documents open to public inspection—
(a) to each of the departments mentioned in regulation 107A;
(b) to a person who has inspected those documents and who is entitled to be supplied with a copy of the marked register or lists by virtue of being a person to whom regulation 108 applies.”.
(9) In regulation 119(3) for “regulation 118(8)” substitute “regulation 118(8)(b)”.

Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006 (c. 13)
4 In the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006, omit section 38 (disclosure of information for security purposes).

Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 (c.18)
5 In the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007, omit—
(a) section 39(4)(g) (permitted disclosure of personal information: disclosure to an Intelligence Service); and
(b) in section 67 (general interpretation), the definition of “Intelligence Service”.—[Mr. McNulty.]

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.

New Schedule 3

Offences relating to information about members of armed forces: supplementary provisions
The following Schedule is inserted after Schedule 8 to the Terrorism Act 2000 (c. 11)—

Offence under section 58A: supplementary provisions

Introduction
1 (1) This Schedule makes supplementary provision relating to the offence in section 58A (eliciting, publishing or communicating information about members of the armed forces).
(2) The purpose of this Schedule is to comply with Directive 2000/31/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the Internal Market (“the E-Commerce Directive”).

Domestic service providers: extension of liability
2 (1) This paragraph applies where a service provider is established in the United Kingdom (a “domestic service provider”).
(2) Section 58A applies to a domestic service provider who—
(a) commits any of the acts specified in subsection (1) of that section in an EEA state other than the United Kingdom, and
(b) does so in the course of providing information society services,
as it applies to a person who commits such an act in the United Kingdom.
(3) In such a case—
(a) proceedings for the offence may be taken at any place in the United Kingdom, and
(b) the offence may for all incidental purposes be treated as having been committed at any such place.

Non-UK service providers: restriction on proceedings
3 (1) This paragraph applies where a service provider is established in an EEA state other than the United Kingdom (a “non-UK service provider”).
(2) Proceedings for an offence under section 58A must not be brought against a non-UK service provider in respect of anything done in the course of the provision of information society services unless the following conditions are met.
(3) The conditions are—
(a) that the bringing of proceedings is necessary for one of the following reasons—
(i) public policy,
(ii) public security, including the safeguarding of national security and defence;
(b) that the proceedings are brought against an information society service that prejudices the objectives referred to in paragraph (a) or presents a serious and grave risk of prejudice to those objectives;
(c) that the bringing of the proceedings is proportionate to those objectives.

Exceptions for mere conduits
4 (1) A service provider is not guilty of an offence under section 58A in respect of anything done in the course of providing so much of an information society service as consists in—
(a) the provision of access to a communication network, or
(b) the transmission in a communication network of information provided by a recipient of the service,
if the following condition is satisfied.
(2) The condition is that the service provider does not—
(a) initiate the transmission,
(b) select the recipient of the transmission, or
(c) select or modify the information contained in the transmission.
(3) For the purposes of sub-paragraph (1)—
(a) the provision of access to a communication network, and
(b) the transmission of information in a communication network,
includes the automatic, intermediate and transient storage of the information transmitted so far as the storage is solely for the purpose of carrying out the transmission in the network.
(4) Sub-paragraph (3) does not apply if the information is stored for longer than is reasonably necessary for the transmission.

Exception for caching
5 (1) This paragraph applies where an information society service consists in the transmission in a communication network of information provided by a recipient of the service.
(2) The service provider is not guilty of an offence under section 58A in respect of the automatic, intermediate and temporary storage of information so provided, if—
(a) the storage of the information is solely for the purpose of making more efficient the onward transmission of the information to other recipients of the service at their request, and
(b) the following conditions are satisfied.
(3) The first condition is that the service provider does not modify the information.
(4) The second condition is that the service provider complies with any conditions attached to having access to the information.
(5) The third condition is that if the service provider obtains actual knowledge that—
(a) the information at the initial source of the transmission has been removed from the network,
(b) access to it has been disabled, or
(c) a court or administrative authority has ordered the removal from the network of, or the disablement of access to, the information.
the service provider expeditiously removes the information or disables access to it.

Exception for hosting
6 (1) A service provider is not guilty of an offence under section 58A in respect of anything done in the course of providing so much of an information society service as consists in the storage of information provided by a recipient of the service, if the condition is met.
(2) The condition is that—
(a) the service provider had no actual knowledge when the information was provided that it contained offending material, or
(b) on obtaining actual knowledge that the information contained offending material, the service provider expeditiously removed the information or disabled access to it.
(3) “Offending material” means information about a person who is or has been a member of Her Majesty’s Forces which is of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism.
(4) This paragraph does not apply if the recipient of the service is acting under the authority or control of the service provider.

Interpretation
7 (1) In this Schedule—
“information society services”—
(a) has the meaning given in Article 2(a) of the E-Commerce Directive (which refers to Article 1(2) of Directive 98/34/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 June 1998 laying down a procedure for the provision of information in the field of technical standards and regulations), and
(b) is summarised in recital 17 of the E-Commerce Directive as covering “any service normally provided for remuneration, at a distance, by means of electronic equipment for the processing (including digital compression) and storage of data, and at the individual request of a recipient of a service”;
“recipient”, in relation to a service, means any person who, for professional ends or otherwise, uses an information society service, in particular for the purposes of seeking information or making it accessible;
“service provider” means a person providing an information society service.
(2) For the purposes of this Schedule whether a service provider is established in the United Kingdom, or in some other EEA state, shall be determined in accordance with the following provisions—
(a) a service provider is established in the United Kingdom, or in a particular EEA state, if the service provider—
(i) effectively pursues an economic activity using a fixed establishment in the United Kingdom, or that EEA state, for an indefinite period, and
(ii) is a national of an EEA state or a company or firm mentioned in Article 48 of the EEC Treaty;
(b) the presence or use in a particular place of equipment or other technical means of providing an information society service does not, of itself, constitute the establishment of a service provider;
(c) where it cannot be determined from which of a number of establishments a given information society service is provided, that service is to be regarded as provided from the establishment at the centre of the service provider’s activities relating to that service.”—[Mr. McNulty.]

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.

Tony McNulty: I beg to move, That certain written evidence already reported to the House be appended to the proceedings of the Committee.
That is another contentious move, but it gives me the opportunity to thank you, Mr. O’Hara, for your time as Chair. Your patience and indulgence—not least of me as the Minister—have been very well received, and I am very grateful for them. May we, through you, send our best wishes to our other Chairman, Mr. Bercow, who, when he was with us, was just as excellent? I am sure that the entire Committee would endorse that fully, especially the hon. Member for Reigate. We also wish Mr. Bercow well because, on the days when you have been chairing our proceedings, he has been enjoying paternity leave with the third addition to his family, and we wish him the very best with that.
I apologise again to the Committee for my little breakfast tantrum, because the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield was entirely right. Despite the import, substance and, sometimes, contention of our proceedings, they have been carried out in a very temperate and well-mannered fashion, for which I am enormously grateful to everybody. The hon. Member for Somerton and Frome has shown that he is a deadly loss to the Liberal Democrat Front Bench. He has done a very good imitation of a Front Bencher and a Back Bencher during our deliberations, while his hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington has done a very good imitation of a no Bencher, since he has not been with us for much of the deliberation. [Interruption.]

Edward O'Hara: Order. The Minister is trying to be nice.

Tony McNulty: That was perfectly deliberate and nothing to do with the absence at lunch at all, and I stand by that remark entirely.
I am grateful to the Welsh guy, as he shall now be known, for his short, pithy, good-humoured and overwhelmingly productive contributions. It is a great credit to his micro-party—[Interruption.] I do not mean on local government in Wales.
During our deliberations, the most significant role that the hon. Member for Gravesham played was as a Tory splitter. He defied the Whip and decided that the future of British politics lies with the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham, rather than with his Front Bench, and I wish him well in that judgment. It was such a memorable and significant split that I cannot remember what the headlines were, but I remember the no vote. I thank the hon. Gentleman for his subsequent no vote—I am sure that that pregnant pause between the “no” and the “vote” will not be reflected in Hansard as meaning quite what it did to the Committee.
I thank the other two ex-soldiers, who are not with us today—the hon. Members for Lancaster and Wyre and for Newark—for colouring our deliberations with their contributions. Perhaps unusually for politicians on Committees, they made significant contributions when they could and shut up when they had nothing to say, which we were grateful for—the first point, not the second. That was good of them.
The rather strange contributions made every now and then by the hon. Member for Monmouth were entertaining, although not as informative as those of his Welsh confrÃ¨re. We now understand that the Tory policy, at least in Monmouth, is to have a Taser in every household and compulsory target practice for the under-60s, or something of that order. I am not entirely sure, but maybe he was making a bid to replace the outgoing right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) with regard to toughening up the law and order team on the Conservative Front Bench. I wish him well in that endeavour, because the notion that he might adorn the Conservative Front Bench as a law and order and Home Office spokesman cheers us up enormously. The sooner that can happen, the better.
Let me say to the Conservative Front Bench that things have been done in an overwhelmingly effective and efficient fashion through the usual channels. The hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield has given an excellent display, once again, of his knowledge, good manners, astuteness, erudition, and of course his efficacitÃ(c) as a member of the Conservative Front Bench. I thank him for his courtesy and kindness. It is always a pleasure to appear opposite him.
Although the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Gedling was not called upon much, I am grateful in many different ways that he was here, because it helps enormously. It almost helped this morning, and perhaps it should have done, given my fit of temper. I am grateful that he was here to be called upon should the necessity arise. When someone asked me why there were two Ministers on the Committee, I said rather unkindly that it was better than being fitted with a catheter, and that is at least part of the reason—nature calls at the most inappropriate times, although not terribly much in this case. I am also grateful to him for all his background work on the Bill before it came to Committee.
I am grateful to all my hon. Friends for their contributions, not least during the evidence sessions. The questioning of witnesses was done well by everyone concerned, and it collectively gave us a good deal of information, for which I am enormously grateful. With as much grace and courtesy as I can, I thank everyone on the Committee for their contributions and deliberations. I hope that we stay as courteous, and move towards consensus—which I certainly remain convinced should not escape us—in terms of every single aspect of the Bill.
My last point is quite deliberately left to the end. I thank very much my hon. Friend the Whip—if I do not, he will kill me—who has kept us in order and has done it very well and in substantial fashion. Apparently—this is getting like a wedding now—I am supposed to thank the photographers—[Interruption.] I thank my officials, and I will thank them in another way once they get the whole Bill through—not now. I thank the police, Hansard and everybody else who has helped us with our deliberations.

Dominic Grieve: I am happy to support the motion and I shall not dwell on it at any length at all. I echo the Minister’s appreciation of yourself, Mr. O’Hara, and also of Mr. Bercow, for chairing our Committee proceedings. I also echo the Minister’s thanks to all the officials and the Clerk of the Committee, who have helped to make these proceedings so easy. This is the first time that I have served on a Committee with evidence-taking sessions, and the first time that I can recall having had departmental briefing sessions during the Bill’s passage. All those seemed to me to be useful and productive, and also provided an opportunity for the involvement of all members of the Committee in its proceedings, which has not always happened in the past.
I would also like to thank the military contingent who have backed me up from the Back Benches in the course of these proceedings—my hon. Friends the Members for Gravesham, for Newark and for Lancaster and Wyre, who came on to this Committee precisely because they wished to provide their specific experience—particularly in security matters—for which I am very grateful.
I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth. I remind the Minister that there was once a time when, for the security of the realm, particularly in counties such as Monmouthshire where Welsh archery originated, it was compulsory to practise at the butts with one’s bows and arrows—so substituting Tasers may only be a technological development, and nothing more. They started them young.
I also thank my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham, who has brought his legal expertise and long experience as a Member of this House to bear on the proceedings of this Committee, and my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate, for helping facilitate the proceedings.
I hope I will be forgiven if I do not do a round. I am grateful to the Liberal Democrats and to the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy for his input. I was greatly cheered during the course of the proceedings when the hon. Member for Nottingham, East, of whom I have long experience as the silent person in Committee when he was a Whip, succeeded in showing us that being deprogrammed from being a Whip is a very difficult thing, when his instinctive reaction to the suggestion that anybody might be voting aye to an amendment was to object to it automatically, thereby showing that his ability to keep abreast of the proceedings and to intervene at the right moment before something terrible happened has not been lost at all on his return to the Back Benches. With those remarks, Mr. O’Hara, and again with thanks to yourself, I am happy to support the motion moved by the Minister.

Tom Brake: I would of course like to support the Minister’s motion, which we are debating in a round-about way. I would like to thank you, Mr. O’Hara, and Mr. Bercow, for your roles in ensuring that our proceedings have been conducted in a fair and considered manner. I also welcome the fact that it is possible for Mr. Bercow to go on paternity leave: that is a positive development in itself.
The Minister has dispatched the Bill with efficacitÃ(c)—an oft-used word—and he has displayed some emollience, although there was a lapse this morning followed by another this afternoon, which I thought uncharacteristic of him.
I have a word of advice for the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Member for Gedling, who has played a supporting role. If my children are getting tetchy after a long day at school, a chocolate biscuit and a drink usually do the job, so I recommend that he comes armed with those in future. [Interruption.]He should ensure that he has those on his person in future.
I have watched with admiration the Labour Whip, who has managed to contain any Back-Bench rebellions with such ease. It was clearly a real struggle. There was no hand-picking of the Back Benchers who sat on this Committee.
A consensus has emerged on certain issues, such as post-charge questioning and intercept evidence. However, it is very clear that we will have to return to the issue of pre-charge detention because no common ground has been identified. We will organise in support of the official Opposition, other parties and Labour Members who are not represented here to ensure that the right thing is done on the argument of 28 versus 42 days.
I am very pleased with how our proceedings have been conducted, Mr. O’Hara, and that we have finished on time.

Elfyn Llwyd: Briefly, on behalf of my micro-party, which is in government in Cardiff, I congratulate you, Mr. O’Hara, and thank you for shepherding the Committee through the last couple of weeks. I also express gratitude to Mr. Bercow.
On the Minister’s profuse apology for his alleged behaviour this morning, I tell him that I have seen far worse. I once had a colleague who was very badly affected by lack of food on occasion, such that he ended up with the unfortunate nickname of Nosebag. I caution the Minister against making any public utterances about that again.
Our debates have been informed and both sides have consistently tried to engage constructively. That is not always the case in Public Bill Committees. Despite the vehement differences of opinion on various provisions of the Bill, they were expressed in good part, with good humour and hon. Members were genuinely respectful of other people’s views. This has been a worthwhile experience, which is often not the case in such Committees.

Edward O'Hara: In making my remarks from this end of the floor, may I say that my co-Chairman, Mr. Bercow, has taken a major share of the chairmanship duties in terms of time and the difficulty of the business, a distribution of duties that was entirely dictated by his happy family circumstances, and I will pass on the remarks that have been made to him.
Starting at this end of the Floor, I thank Hansard, which I am sure has kept a correct record of the occasional spoonerisms that Chairmen commit. I thank the Clerks at my elbow for their constant assistance. On my right, those who are seen but not heard have conducted themselves with exceptional dignity and propriety in this Committee, unlike in other Committees sometimes.
In referring to the members of the Committee, I run out of complimentary adjectives. This has been a very impressive Committee to chair in terms of the general mastery of the briefs on both sides—disciplined, restrained, with an avoidance of repetition, succinct, constructive, courteous, respectful, with give and take, and constant good humour. That has led to a high level of debate, as befits the seriousness of the subject matter before us, and has made it easy for me to conduct the efficient dispatch of our business.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill, as amended, to be reported.

Committee rose at twenty-six minutes past Three o’clock.